Between Lightning and Flash
by Anisky
Summary: A mistake on the part of one of Sarah's friends leaves a disaster far worse than just Toby being wished away. Can Sarah help stop a horrible invasion? Or will she accept things she never thought she could?


Title: The Difference of Lightning and Flash  
  
Prologue: Setting the Stage

Author: Anisky

Summary: A mistake on the part of one of Sarah's friends leaves a disaster far worse than just Toby being wished away. Can Sarah help stop a horrible invasion? Or will she accept things she never thought she could?

Rating: R

Archiving: Sure, just ask me!

_She was in the Escher room again. Chasing Toby around the room, trying to catch him as he chased a bouncing crystal. He giggled, and she ran after him as he climbed over what looked like a cliff but somehow, the rules of gravity didn't apply and he could crawl on the ceiling just as well as the floor. _

_The laws of gravity applied to Sarah, though. She desperately ran around the room, trying to find a route when he didn't have the same restrictions. _

_And there he was, the Goblin King, singing to her about hearts and love and... suddenly she couldn't run, or move at all, and he was there, in front of her, getting closer, and all thoughts of Toby flew from her mind..._

Sarah's alarm clock went off, blaring music, and she sat straight up. "Shit," she muttered, learning over to turn off her alarm, blaring at six in the morning, and ran a hand through her hair. She'd been dreaming about _it _again-- Him again. Her journey. She had only the vague remnants of her dream: the room, chasing Toby, and Him. She remembered the journey itself perfectly. It had been three years, but something about the experience ensured that she did not forget a single detail.

"He" always got capitals in her mind, somehow. Jareth, the Goblin King. He was too important, too impressive to be thought of like everybody else.

Sarah crawled reluctantly out of bed and plodded across the hall to the bathroom, grabbing a towl on her way. She splashed cold water on her face, trying to pull herself out of the dreamy haze. She removed her nightgown, and stepped into the shower, enjoying the warmth of the water and the rising steam. Since she'd woken up early that morning, she enjoyed her shower, washing her hair and rubbing sweet smelling bath gel on herself.  
  
Eventually she had to get out, and she shivered as she stepped out of the shower and wrapped the bathrobe around herself as quickly as possible. She washed her face, brushed her teeth, exfoliated, felt particularly feminine, and doused herself with water again. Finally, she walked back into her room, tolerably awake.

She was up earlier than usual, because today her drama group was going to the elementary school to perform a play. It was called "Magical Theater", some generic kids' play. Still, it would be fun. She took extra care in dressing, with a nice skirt and an oversized sweater, although she'd be changing clothes for the play anyway. She checked to make sure all of the right costumes, props, and makeup were in her backpack, as well as the books for her last three classes. Satisfied, she descended the stairs for breakfast.

"Hello Dad, Karen," she greeted cheerfully as she entered the kitchen. "What's for breakfast?"

Her father and stepmother looked tolerably surprised at Sarah's arrival. "Well," her father said, "You're up early, aren't you?"

"Going to the elementary school again, remember?" she told them. "I always get up early on special days." She smiled and sat down. "Cereal, then, I guess."

Karen glared at Sarah for a moment, for the implied criticism in the lack of any prepared breakfast. Karen just threw up her hands, however, not saying anything as Sarah got the milk and Cheerios. She didn't have a retort.

At seven thirty, a horn blared outside, Sarah leapt up. "Well, Sean is giving me a ride, since I don't have to be at high school until 6th period. I'll see you guys tonight! Remember, I have rehearsal tonight, so I'll be home around seven."

"Just make sure it's seven," grumbled Karen. "I don't want you to be late. Remember, your father and I are going out tonight."

"Yeah, yeah," Sarah muttered. Of course they were going out; it was a Friday. They always went out on Friday, despite the denials of her step mother. Sarah grabbed her backpack and ran outside to the black convertible parked by her house.

"Hey, Sean, what's up?" she asked as she hopped into the car without opening the door (which, incidentally, didn't open).

"Oh, not much," he said. "Dead from driving this early."

Sarah laughed and turned on the car radio. "You don't mind, do you?" she asked as the last notes of some song came on.

"Not at all," replied Sean, pushing the car into first gear and speeding away from her house. The next song came on from the car radio, blaring..

_"We were meant to live for so much more,  
  
_Have we lost ourselves?

We were meant to live, we were meant to live"

"Mmm," Sarah smiled and leaned back. She loved Sean's convertible; she loved the feeling of the wind through her hair, even though it was chilly this morning and it messed up her hair. There was something so freeing about the feeling. "This song makes me sort of happy and sad at the same time."

"I know what you mean," said Sean, looking over at the girl next to him and smiling. "So, are you excited for the play?"

"A bunch of screaming 7-year-olds who we have to humor? Yeah, actually I think it'll be fun. And my Trigonometry test was take home since I couldn't be there, which was also _exciting_. It's a Friday, I don't see why they can't let us just have off the whole day. I mean, we go to school for two hours and that's it? Why bother making us at all?"

Sean smirked. "You could always cut, you know, Sarah."

Sarah sighed. "I know. Damn me and my law-abiding ways. You're still picking me up after school, right?"

"Of course I am! It would just be nice to spend that time with you after the performance."

Sarah looked over at Sean a little suspiciously, but his eyes were on the road so she wasn't able to discern anything. She shrugged and turned up the radio, which was by this time playing a Santana song. She sang along until they got to the school.

They pulled into the elementary school parking lot, and headed into the building. "We have a little over half an hour to warm up," Sean announced. Elana, Carl, and Lucy parked just then, and hopped out of the car, waving and calling to Sean and Sarah.

"Hey Seanie, Sarie," exclaimed Lucy, jumping and hugging Sarah. "Isn't this exciting? I don't know, well, _I'm_ excited."

Sarah laughed and hugged back. "Hey Lucy," she greeted the only girl whom she would ever let call her 'Sarie.' Lucy was dressed eccentrically, as usual, in a fuzzy light pink sweater with a black knee-length skirt and fishnets. Only she could pull together an outfit like that.

Elana and Carl came up more slowly, and a bit less excited, with tired 'Hello's and a few yawns, and they all walked into the elementary school. Lucy and Carl, who had gone to that particular school, lead the group to the auditorium.

They began the voice exercises, and Lucy handed out oranges for those who were too much in a rush to get breakfast. The others arrived slowly, over the next half an hour, until all 16 members of the cast had arrived, only five minutes before they were slated to begin.

"I wish all of you would make a point of getting here on time," the acting teacher said disapprovingly. The late comers at least had the grace to look guilty.

Sarah peaked out from behind the curtain to look at how big the audience was. A couple hundred little kids were sitting there, poking each other, whining, and generally being restless. The auditorium was almost filled up, so it looked like everybody had arrived.

"Oh, Sarie!" exclaimed Lucy, making Sarah jump. She turned around.

"Yes?" she asked.

"After the bear skit, we're waiting longer than we thought to search for the Magical Key. Some of us-- well, me," Lucy blushed, "Added in a short scene after that, we told everyone else when you were absent a few days ago, and forgot to warn you, so be prepared, I'm sorry we forgot to warn you, you know, a lot has been going on. It was actually based on that book of yours you gave me." She stopped and tried to regain breath. Lucy had a habit of speaking very quickly, so it was sometimes a little hard to follow her.

Only one thing stood out to Sarah, though. "What book? What's the line?" She had a sinking feeling. Her vision swam.

"Well, you know how we go to a magic fairy land? Well, it gave me an idea on how to get there with a cool gimmick. You know that play you used to love, _Labyrinth_? It's based on that--"

Sarah turned white and gaped, but Lucy didn't notice, because right then the acting teacher spoke up.

"All right everybody, get ready for scene one! Sarah, Michael, Jane, and Marianne, out on stage now!"

Sarah had no choice-- severely flustered, praying that nothing would go wrong, she walked out on stage and began the opening act of talking to the children, introducing them to the idea of the play.

The beginning of the play went well, although Sarah didn't perform her best since she was worrying herself sick. How could she have missed this? True, all of the separate groups were allowed to organize their own skits, but why didn't Lucy tell her before hand? Sarah had the worst feeling that Jareth had had some unseen hand in all of this.

_Relax, Sarah, you're just being paranoid, _she tried to tell herself. But she couldn't be sure of that.

The bear skit went well; Sarah played a doe, though her fright and jitteriness weren't just acted today. She was terrified; as it ended, she held her breath to see what Lucy would do. Sarah wasn't religious, but as she stood there, she prayed. Please God, please let nothing bad happen, please...

Lucy walked out to the stage, talking loudly to Jordan. "The key isn't anywhere, is it! You know what I bet? I bet it's in a _magical world._"

"But how will we get there?" asked Jordan. "We need to bring eveeeryone there!" He gestured to the audience. "We all need to be there when we find the key! We all want to go to the magical world, right?"

"RIGHT!" called back the children. Sarah almost fainted from terror, but everyone was watching Lucy and Jordan.

"You need the special magic words!" replied Lucy.

"Do you know the special magic words?" asked Jordan. It was all overacted for the sake of the children. Any other time Sarah would find it all very silly.

"Yes! I do!" exclaimed Lucy. "Here we go. Are you all ready?!"

All the kids screamed again. "YES!" Sarah's head throbbed.

"I wish," Lucy said slowly, milking it, walking towards the front of the stage. "I wish..."

She let it hang in the air again as many of the little kids started to yell "Say them! Tell us!"

"I wish," said Lucy, "that the goblins would take everyone away--"

Sarah had to do something. Even if she made a fool of herself, it was better than what might happen. They could improvise something. She launched herself at Lucy and started to scream "NO!"

"--right now!"

Suddenly, it was dark. All of the lights stopped working, all at once. The little kids started screaming. It was pandemonium. Sarah fell to the floor mid-launch and hit the floor, hard, with a horrible feeling in her stomach... it was too late. She tried to tell herself that it was a coincidence, but she knew right then with a horrible, sick feeling that it wasn't. This was because of Him. The Goblin King was behind all of this.

Sarah's breath became shallow. Who knew how he was going to take that line? The goblins take _everyone_ away? That was nothing like when she wished away Toby. Who was everybody? All of the little kids in the auditorium?

The next few moments felt like an eternity as she started to feel actually nauseated. She became lightheaded. He was going to turn on the lights and appear any moment, she was waiting for it. She didn't want Him to arrive, yet the waiting was an even worse agony than his actual appearance.

The lights flickered back on. Some not-so-mysterious force had actually thrown everybody to the floor, but Sarah didn't notice. She only noticed one thing, or rather, one person: the one who haunted her nightmares, and her dreams, for the past three years. He stood there, on the stage, looming above everybody, smirking. In all of his glittery, ominous, mocking glory, there He stood. His appearance sent a horrible, yet oddly pleasurable, thrill through Sarah's entire body.

The Goblin King.

A/N: It's very difficult to create an original Labyrinth fanfiction. Indeed, some even thing that there's not much of a niche for it; most of my favorite Labyrinth fanfictions all follow the same general plotline. This is an attempt on my part to find a lesser-used line. It IS rated R, and it WILL have "adult" scenes. Be warned, and please, review!! Oh, AMAZING brownie points for anybody who can reference the title, though I doubt it. The quote will be supplied in the next chapter (Chapter I).


End file.
